AAdvantage Will Absorb Dividend Miles Accounts in 2015
Jeff Edwards October 28, 2014
On Tuesday, American Airlines set the terms under which US Airways Dividend Miles accounts and AAdvantage loyalty accounts will be merged.
When US Airways and American Airlines merged to form the world’s largest airline in 2013, it was decided that the new airline would keep the American Airlines name, but top management from US Airways would run the new company. Despite a corporate structure dominated by US Airways executives, it has primarily been US Airways that has changed its rules and policies to bring it more in line with American as the company moves toward integration.
The combination of the carriers’ frequent flyer loyalty programs has been viewed as a major hurdle in the integration process. On Tuesday, the company announced the two will merge during the second quarter of 2015. In the spirit of other post-merger changes, American’s AAdvantage program will remain largely unchanged and US Airways Dividend Miles members will be transferred to the AAdvantage program.
The AAdvantage program will keep the three-tier system for elite status in place and continue to allow its members to earn status through elite-qualifying miles, points and segments.
Dividend Miles status holders will be offered comparable status in the AAdvantage program. Dividend Miles Silver Preferred status holders will become AAdvantage Gold members; Dividend Miles Gold Preferred and Platinum Preferred status holders will become AAdvantage Platinum members; Dividend Miles Chairman’s Preferred status holders will become AAdvantage Executive Platinum members. Qualifying points earned by US Airways Dividend Miles members will transfer to new AAdvantage accounts or be combined with an existing AAdvantage account on a one-to-one ratio.
Earlier this month, Delta Air Lines increased the minimum qualifying miles required to obtain elite Medallion status. There has since been speculation that American would follow Delta’s lead and raise the bar for earning elite status within its loyalty program. During Tuesday’s announcement, American confirmed that an increase is on the way. Beginning January 1, 2015, qualifying for AAdvantage Executive Platinum status will require 120 qualifying segments, rather than the current 100 qualifying segments. Other than this increase, the tiers for elite status will remain unchanged.
Redeeming upgrades on each carrier will be subject to the individual policies of each airline until their reservation systems are integrated at the end of 2015.
[Photo: American Airlines]
Delta did NOT increase the MQM requirements (they remain at 25K, 50K, 75K, and 125K), they increased the corresponding MQD requirements about how much you must spend in addition to meeting the mileage or segment requirements. Saying they "increased the minimum qualifying miles" is misleading.
I am thinking about doing a trial preferred on US for CP which requires 30K miles and will provide status until Feb 2016. When the programs merge any speculation as to whether I will receive EXP (plus benefits) or will just the 30K flown count towards status in the combined programs?
@Jeffhacker - As long as your US segments/miles + AA segments/miles add up to at least 120 segments or 100,000 miles, you will be EXP. Example 40 US segments + 85 AA segments = 125 total segments and EXP in new program. Cheers
The key thing will be how they combine peoples' miles from both programs. Does US Silver + AA Platinum equal Combined Exec.Platinum? From what they've said so far, it looks like it might.